Amaro still has questions about bring Brown up

Ruben Amaro Jr. made the final call, but don’t think he doesn’t have some concerns about calling up Dom Brown to fill Shane Victorino’s spot on the 25-man roster.

“There's still a question on whether he's ready to play on a regular basis here, but circumstances changed and I changed my mind,” the Phils GM said less than 24 hours after telling reporters the team’s top prospect wasn’t ready to be called up again. “Is it the right thing to do? I'm not sure. But it's the right thing to do for our club right now, it's a different kind of circumstance having lost Shane. Frankly I like the choice of Brownie over the other choices we had.”

Charlie Manuel and Amaro met in Manuel’s office after addressing reporters Thursday night and came to the agreement that Brown was the go-to-guy.

However, Brown is not in Friday’s starting lineup because Manuel doesn’t want the youngester facing a lot of lefties early on.

“The more we talked and the more that we talked about my plans on how to play him, we decided it was time to bring him up, “ Manuel said. “We’re going to give him a chance. At first, more than likely he will not play against left-handers. Eventually he will. I’ll try to bring him along just like I have a lot of young players.”

Brown said his comfort level this time around as opposed to when he made his big-league debut late last July is night and day.

“Much calmer,” he said. “I’m here just to work and just to have fun out there. Last year I didn’t know what to expect. This year, coming in, I know exactly what to expect, I know all the guys in the clubhouse, and I’m ready to go.”

LIDGE TURNING A CORNER

Brad Lidge will throw another bullpen, likely Saturday, and then he said on Sunday night he’ll head to Clearwater for extended spring training.

“I might be a little ahead (of schedule),” he said. “I know for sure I’ll need at least four or five games. I don’t exactly know, but hopefully maybe three weeks from now is a possibility if everything goes right. We were saying before the end of June, and that’s definitely possible. Maybe mid-June if everything goes right.”

Lidge said he expects to make a rehab appearance or two with Reading or Lehigh Valley.

UTLEY UPDATE

Chase Utley is the DH in tonight’s Threshers game and is on the schedule to play in the field Saturday.

Amaro re-iterated that he doesn’t think Utley will necessarily make any rehab appearances with Reading or Lehigh Valley.

And he may not need to play three complete games in a row before being activated.

“Frankly I don’t know how many games he’s going to play three in a row here (early on),” Amaro said. “We may be in a situation when he comes in the big leagues where he’s one game on, one game off, two games on, one game off. He might play three games – I don’t know. A lot will depend on how he feels. But I think we’re going to have to monitor him when he gets here.”

VICTORINO STATUS

Victorino could be out 2-3 weeks and will almost definitely go on a rehab outing when he's ready, Manuel and Amaro said.